Vox populi: Does state-funded ‘Lukashenka’s Komsomol’ serve Belarus?


The government will do its best to improve the living conditions of young people, Belarus president Aliaksandr Lukashenka said on Tuesday at the 42nd Congress of the BRSM (the Belarusian Republican Youth Union), the country’s biggest youth organisation.

For many years the BRSM, commonly named Lukashenka’s Komsomol, has been instilling discipline and loyalty to the incumbent president to a new generation of Belarusians.

“Belarus is one of the few countries where the youth movement is in the focus of the government. As the head of state, I believe that among the most important and strategic tasks is the formation of the generation that would make the core of our hardworking, educated and healthy nation,” Lukashenka said. 

But this ‘focus’ is different. While the BRSM receives several millions of dollars from the state budget annually, the youths protesting against Lukashenka’s policy are arrested and fined. When youth parties seek recognition and registration by the state, their applications are turned down, which outlaws their political activity in the Republic of Belarus. As for the BRSM, their situation is different – its members has the full backing of the regime.

Does Lukashenka’s pet project deliver benefits to Belarus? Belsat TV asked residents of Minsk about their attitude to the BRSM (English subtitles):

“The BRSM in Lukashenka’s Belarus is like Komsomol in the USSR – it serves political purposes, i.e ideological brainwashing, diverting youth’s attention from political issues,” Ales Lahviniec, a political scientist and university professor, told Belsat TV.

www.belsat.eu/en

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